sleep
The most common block that I hear to adequate sleep is not enough time. Working full time or more than full time, wanting to spend time with the kids, household projects to catch up on, and then the understandable desire for just one half hour of “me time,” all contribute to shorter hours spent in bed. The thought is that everything else is a priority, and sleep is simply a luxury.
Many people believe that the payoff is as simple as not feeling quite as rested the next day, needing a bit more coffee and perhaps a sugary snack to perk up the following afternoon. There seems to be a cultural virtue assigned to the person who can “get by” on less sleep and still power through their responsibilities. Who hasn’t heard the joke, “I’ll sleep when I’m dead”?
I challenge this block with information: It has not yet become common, household knowledge how lack of sleep undermines our health and why we must prioritize adequate, restful, deep sleep in order to reach and maintain vitality and good health, so I will attempt to lay it out here. The evidence is clear; it is very well established how sleep is more than just a feel-good luxury that promotes beauty and helps us feel rested.
Sleep is when we restore, form new neural networks, and how we consolidate memory for the tasks and information learned throughout the day. Shorter hours spent snoozing contribute to more daytime fatigue and more frequent memory problems, so ultimately, a decrease in efficiency and productivity are the trade-off as well as trouble retaining and accessing information new information. Thus the common complaints I hear in my office: My focus is gone. I am just not holding on to any information. I am not remembering new information as well as I used to.
In addition to neurocognitive effects, habitually shorting oneself on sleep is linked to important harmful cardiometabolic outcomes, including weight gain, obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease such as heart attack and stroke. It appears from the evidence-based research that a habit of scrimping on sleep leads to unbalanced metabolism, which in turn leads to appetite dysregulation and cardiometabolic disease.
One benefit I’ve found is that by getting an extra hour of sleep prior to midnight, I’m more focused the next day and can accomplish so much more in less amount of time with clarity of mind than days when I’ve stayed up too late the night before. Suddenly, that extra hour in bed has translated to accomplishing my work in far less time and I come out ahead in terms of efficiency and vitality.
What if we dedicate ourselves to getting more sleep but we are unable to relax and fall asleep? Removing electronics and bright lights in the hours before bed can help. Turn off phones and tablets, computers and reading devices and store them in another room. A warm bath raises body temperature and the natural cooling effect when out of the bath helps cause drowsiness. Adding Epsom salts to the bath adds absorbable magnesium, a natural muscle relaxant. Enjoy a cup of soothing tea including passionflower (Passiflora), or holy basil (Tulsi) can help as well – these two herbs in particular I’ve found more effective than traditional chamomile or other relaxing teas.
Alcohol can make us sleepy as a central nervous system depressant but ultimately can disrupt sleep cycles and cause us to wake in the night, so changing the habit of nightly alcohol is an important step to getting more quality sleep. If this is a difficult habit to shift, you are not alone! Identifying and releasing the anxieties that underlie dependence on alcohol, sugar, caffeine, etc., releases us from a habitual cycle of dependence on substances to calm us at night and perk us in the morning. This is the deep work that I enjoy undertaking with patients to help transform habits easily and naturally as beliefs change and blocks are released. Balance occurs without having to apply willpower, but simply because the body is granted the free-flowing energy needed for self-healing.
Sometimes a sleep study is recommended, which can help diagnose and treat sleep apnea, a lack of oxygen to the brain due to frequent awakenings at night and inability to access all phases of sleep. Many of my patients were resistant to a sleep study but once fitted with a CPAP, cannot believe how much better they feel and how much energy they experience!
Knowing the risks, understanding why belly fat, waistlines and fatigue are increasing and blood sugar values are creeping up year after year, and why memory and sharp thinking are fading can be helpful in making an informed decision to prioritize sleep. In combination with the other four foundational health practices of adequate hydration, deep breathing throughout the day, nutritious food and moving the body, good health (including a sharper mind, a stronger heart and a flatter belly) are yours!
Sleep. 2017 Jan 1; 40(1). Modeling Neurocognitive Decline and Recovery During Repeated Cycles of Extended Sleep and Chronic Sleep Deficiency, Melissa A. St. Hilaire, PhD, et al.
Physiol Rev. 2013 Apr; 93(2): 681–766. About Sleep's Role in Memory, Björn Rasch and Jan Born.
Neuroimage. 2019 Feb 10;191:1-9. An increase in sleep slow waves predicts better working memory performance in healthy individuals. Ferrarelli F, et al.
Sleep Med Rev. 2010;14:239–47. Problems associated with short sleep: bridging the gap between laboratory and epidemiological studies. Grandner MA, Patel NP, Gehrman PR, Perlis ML, Pack AI.
Int J Endocrinol. 2010:2010. Sleep and metabolism: an overview. Sharma S, Kavuru M.
Best Pract Res Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2010;24(5):731–43. Sleep duration and cardiometabolic risk: a review of the epidemiologic evidence. Knutson KL.